Saturday, August 19, 2006

"What would your life be like if from this moment forth you regarded your sufferings as refinements? Then the image of sacrifice and refinement would work deep in your mind and soul. The suffering, which is inevitable, would be the vehicle for the recasting of your nature. Then pathos might becomes mythos, and instead of suffering in the school of hard knocks, you would find yourself whipped into consecrated shape, becoming a Grail instead of a crushed plastic cup."

Jean Houston, from The Search for the Beloved.

I've decided to get a labyrinth tattooed on my back. I've been looking at labyrinths for hours and I've selected this one. Guess which labyrinth it is and I will give you a dollar or a bag of sour gummy worms. Your choice.

Also, I've learned that "labyrinth" is one of those words which start to seem mispelled if you look it at too many times.

"See first, think later, then test. But always see first. Otherwise you will only see what you were expecting. Most scientists forget that."

Douglas Adams (1952 - 2001)

"Speech is the mirror of the mind.(Imago Animi Sermo Est)"

Seneca (5 BC - 65 AD)

My body hurts. At work, I move hundreds of pounds of industrial equipment a day. It comes in all shapes and sizes but most are big and awkward. The problem seems to be that I am capable of manipulating more weight than my joints, tendons, and ligaments are used to dealing with.

Sunday, August 13, 2006

Backblog go!

I've been meandering about writing on scraps of paper and I'm compiling them here because I will lose them. They're in reverse chronological order because why the hell not?

8-12-06

During my hour and half of sleep last night, I dreamt of Kate. I was house-sitting for a moderately wealthy family and she came over. I was aroused. When I went to meet her, I found a friend of hers sitting on a couch in semi-darkness. She introduced herself (the name escapes me now, but I did not know her) and then she kissed me passionately, almost violently, her teeth hitting my own. I was surprised, mumbled hello, and went to look for Kate. I met many more people that she had invited over. Mostly unsavory types, Limp Bizkit fans, known pornographers, and the like. There were also two young boys with a pet monkey. It was yellow and had black spots. Its name was "The Cheat." The monkey had bitten one boy pretty badly and the other boy was explaining why The Cheat wasn't a bad monkey, but a good monkey who had done a bad thing. The police came. I never found Kate because I awoke 30 minutes before my alarm was scheduled to go off. I didn't sleep much in the interim.

8-12-06

The household god must be appeased.

8-11-06

He goes to his bed as a bridegroom to a bride.

8-10-06

Bedroom floor strewn with alkalides and broken rubber bands. He writhes silently, dreaming of running. If not in his own room when he falls asleep, he will often break things. There is little he can do. There are no pills against happy dreams.

8-9-06

They're patient. They're insidious. And they're very, very good at what they do. They're on every corner. If you follow your friends around long enough, you're certain to catch them meeting. Bright and attractive, they know they can wait. When a moment of weakness comes upon you, you will turn around and see an inviting glow. And if you give in just once, they'll have you. Because it is good, there's no doubt about that. There is something you will like. It'll get easier after the first time. Your body will turn against you and you'll want it even more. You'll get it, feel good, feel worse, then want more. Truly, fast food is the devil's kitchen.

Running out of things to fear. All the sentients still try to convince each other that there is no such thing. They pass the blame onto freedom. Whose responsibility lies in giving it up? I won't be late again, I promise. Couldn't be helped; now even less so. I've got a feeling. No, you haven't. A feeling has you.

"Let's kick the shit out of those shit-asses!"

8-3-06

Peeling away layers of unnecessary roughness.

8-2-06

Little room for error now. Now only room for little errors.

Winds play "Love-me-not" with innocent bysquatting shrubs. Pick pick pick denude the branches and move on. "She loves me She loves me She loves me" Leaves half-eaten by insects count for two. "She loves me twice!" Chlorophyll and freedom mix until the air is stifled, until the winds move on or the Earth moves under them. Others play with worlds "She loves me She loves me She loves me. This planet is half-eaten by people. She loves me twice!"

8-1-06

After watching Solaris I fell asleep. I dreamt, of course, and saw her there. We sat across from each other with nothing between us or behind us. Her voice was the same but her hair was shorter. Well, shorter than I remember it. It may be that length now. I'd like to know.

She looked at me and I looked away even though there was nothing else to look at. Our conversation was civil, and in gentle voices we discussed matters of little importance. I was happy just to hear her speak to me.

Then I realized that this was a dream because in the waking world she doesn't speak to me. I'm not sure exactly why but I'm sure it's slightly more than a matter of convenience. I shared this thought with her (but it wasn't her.)

"Do you want me to go?" she asked, speaking directly into my eyes as always. I didn't know. As I was debating I woke up. I fought to fall back asleep but when I did she was gone. This is not the first time we've met like that, nor was it the first time I tried to go back to her (but it isn't her.)

"You can only be two things: confused, or totally confused." -Michael Vansickle, age 11.

7-28-06

The moon is old and yellow. Well, not right now. If it were I would scatter like crows. Leave only the chamber maids. It is a beach here, without an ocean.

7-27-06

Why be a writer? Guillermo six years ago would have yelled "Why be anything?" and then hopped into the back of a moving Jeep dressed up as the Ghost of Christmas Past.

The Guillermo from four years ago would have said "Why not be a writer?" and then gone running for an hour along a dark canal.

Two years ago, I would have become defensive and retorted with "I am a writer...I just haven't written anything yet."

I ask myself today and I have a new answer. I need to be a writer because I go crazy sometimes and I need a way to indulge it...safely. Or at least, constructively. Writing is when I face the music and dance on the fragile boundaries between reality and everything else. I need to. If I don't do this on a regular basis, lines blur and I live half-awake, my imagination overlapping every surface with flickering pictures as if from an ancient movie projector.

7-26-06

Hours seem short. It is not having that which makes them seem long.

As always, bowed heads and scrabbling hands dig soft tunnels into time that collapse as we do, in a dust of grey memory.

7-20-06

After much display, I am back under my tree. Not much, I guess. I think I was noticed and expect to incur an antisocial label. Not one of the values here, I expect.

Lunch today with Danny and Lindsay. That is, I expect at least they will be there but I am unsure of whom else. I must prepare the letter for Beth. She will forget I promised to this time, I'll wager.

This life makes me wonder. I expect the unexpected to happen to me. I am spoiled, I guess. I am less comfortable initiating.

I can mix up my own Gatorade here. Not as sweet as I like it, but I drink a lot so I cut down on sugar this way. Sugar does not serve me as well for energy. I am more like a diesel engine. I prefer slow-burning fuels.

I'm considering scar reduction. They'll cut me up and sew it back. No anesthetic would be appropriate.

Oranges can be so messy. How dare they. I've been getting sores inside my mouth. I must lack a vitamin. Hence the orange. This is an experiment. My favorite kind, because it involves eating. 12:55 pm has been an exceptionally long minute. I'll need a new belt soon. Losing weight too quickly. Not weight, really. I am still about 200 pounds. My waist is decreasing in circumference. Maybe now society will find me acceptable.

7-19-06

I logged in to SAP to fill out my SIRF form. Not a good sign...

This job is good for me. It takes organization, exact recall, communication, and a lot of hustle. These are areas that I have allowed to lay fallow for too long.

I run around like mad. Between this, cycling everywhere, a diet virtually free of corn syrup, and a religious adherence to my workout schedule (well, as religious as I ever was), I've felt much better in general. My sleep has been halved but I still function pretty well. (The not drinking helps, I think.) My internal clock is back, too. Waking up when I have to serves me well. Hmm, I've never used these notches on this belt.

7-18-06

I am braver in the dark of night. Courage ebbs away by dawn, a character trait with a vampiric ethic.

Love for others must not have at its base attachment, clinging, and expectation. This will create a hunger that cannot be satisfied. Best the keep these at the periphery where they may remain miraculous.

4-27-06

"Something of this kind has to be recognized and dealt with by any serious student of art. If you go to a master to study and learn the techniques, you diligently follow all the instructions the master puts upon you. But then comes the time for using the rules in your own way and not being bound by them. That is the time for the lion-deed. You can actually forget the rules because they have been assimilated. You are an artist. Your own innocence now is of one who has become an artist, who has been, as it were, transmuted. You don't have to behave as the person behaves who has never mastered an art."

-Joseph Campbell, The Power of Myth

4-24-06

There are no prayers to find here. And what, then, if there were? Would I now be lying in warm bed with her in my arms? "You seem happy."

"Thank you."

Seeming happy is almost as well as being happy. When memory serves, a happiness will be recalled along with the unease. Laughter will drown doubts and jokes will shovel dirt onto the gleaming new caskets.

4-21-06

Do not forget what E.O. Wilson Told you. Do not forget what Alan Lightman told you. When it comes to learning facts and explaining them, science is the only game in town. When it comes to understanding life (with capital "L"), the universe, and everything, Art will show you the final door. I don't believe that door can ever be opened by one, the other, or even both. But I don't worry too much about that yet. I'll figure that out when I come to it.

Ryan Adams is also worth remembering. True love isn't hard to find. Not that I would know. Not yet. Not at the time the knowledge would have been of some use and not yet. I could write you over and over a million times. Lightman speaks of wanting, passionate wanting. Immersion. A place where there is nothing else to breathe. Sustain yourself on this choking nectar until it weeps even from your oldest wounds. Let your lover taste it on your lips.